After some time with teenagers, I was ready to be with a family with children. The one who found me had 1 child, were fairly close to my house, and only needed me 4 days a week. NannyGirl (Ng) was a precious little girl, with big brown eyes, and long curly hair. Her parents were each on their 2ed marriage, and wanted one child to be the center of their universe. They both worked from home, and would rather me NOT go anywhere with their darling. Ng was about 18months old when I started, just about ready to start talking to the world.
Ng and I would play outside in the morning, have lunch with the family, then she would take a 2hr nap, we'd finish up our day with a bath lasting longer than an hour, and fixing of hair. She had love of TV already, and had a stream of shows on TV, and movies that we watched ALL THE TIME. "Bear In The Big Blue House", "Snow White" and "Monsters, Inc" were some of her favorites. I started calling her names based on which character we were watching.
We met a group of mom's in the neighborhood who had children all the same age, and we were able to make friends, with the limited access to the outside world we had. Unfortunately, since Ng was not going to a preschool/daycare she had no defences against your normal "kid" germs, and she would get very sick after every play date.
After a couple of months of this, I started to get the itch for life beyond the boundaries of their house. We asked once to go to a play date in the neighborhood, and the mom drove us. I was not 15 at the time, I was 23 and we weren't leaving the neighborhood, but still, we got a ride. For lunch, Ng was required to have items on her plate that looked, tasted, and felt different. For example, she could have square crackers, bell pepper cut into strips, and a sandwich had to be cut into triangles.
All of this, and I wasn't making a ton of $$. I tried talking to the parent's about this, and they offered me the job of cleaning their house to make more income. This was a little startling to me, since I have a hard time keeping my own house clean! We tried that for awhile, but in the end, I decided that this was just not the fit for me. While I was wrestling with the idea of leaving Ng, it just ripped my heart out. I would lay in bed at night thinking about how much I would miss her, and just cry and cry.
At that point, I contacted the nanny agency to try and find me another family. When the parents found out about that, the were very upset at the agency for not alerting them to the situation. Needless to say, it was a tense work environment for a month.
On my last day I had Ng make a ton of projects, with paint, play dough, and crayons. We cut some out and put them in a frame for her mom. I set them on the counter for her and she said, "Ok, see ya".
Of course, I miss little Ng, and wonder how her life is now. She won't remember the women who taught her how to turn over rocks and look for bugs, or what the colors are named, but I remember her and her sweet face, and to me, she'll always be that sweet little girl.
No comments:
Post a Comment